Koneru Humpy (born 31 March 1987) is an Indian chess grandmaster, the strongest woman player the country has produced. In 2002, at fifteen, she became the youngest woman up to that time to earn the full grandmaster title. She was the second woman in history to reach a rating of 2600, played a match for the world title in 2011, and has twice won the Women’s World Rapid Championship, in 2019 and 2024.
Quick Facts
| Full name | Koneru Humpy |
| Born | 31 March 1987, Gudivada, Krishna district, Andhra Pradesh |
| Age | 39 |
| Sport | Chess |
| Title | Grandmaster (2002) |
| Peak rating | 2623 (2009) |
| Major titles | Women’s World Rapid Champion (2019, 2024); World Junior Girls’ Champion (2001); Asian Games gold (2006) |
| Awards | Arjuna Award (2003), Padma Shri (2007) |
| Spouse | Dasari Anvesh |
| Children | 1 |
Early Life
She was born at Gudivada in coastal Andhra Pradesh. Her father, Koneru Ashok, a chemistry lecturer and a state-level chess player, named her “Hampi”, from the word champion, and later adjusted the spelling. He noticed, when she was five, that she had suggested a good move in a game he was analysing. He gave up his job to coach her, and has remained her trainer.
Prodigy
She won the world championships for girls under ten, under twelve and under fourteen, and in 2001, at fourteen, the World Junior Girls’ Championship, for players under twenty. She also competed in boys’ and open events, winning the Asian under-twelve boys’ title.
In May 2002, at the age of fifteen years, one month and twenty-seven days, she completed the requirements for the grandmaster title, beating by about three months the record set by Judit Polgar of Hungary. She was India’s first woman grandmaster.
Career
At the top
In October 2007 her rating passed 2600, a mark that only Polgar among women had reached before. For several years she was ranked second among the world’s women.
- two gold medals at the Asian Games in Doha in 2006, in the women’s individual event and with the mixed team
- winner of several events in the women’s Grand Prix series
- semi-finalist in the women’s world championship knock-out in 2004, 2008 and 2010
In 2011 she earned the right to challenge Hou Yifan of China for the world title. She lost the match in Tirana.
Break and return
She married in 2014 and stopped playing in 2016; her daughter was born the following year. She returned in 2018 after about two years away and within months was back among the leading players.
World Rapid Champion
In December 2019, in Moscow, she won the Women’s World Rapid Championship after a tie-break. She won it again in New York in December 2024, becoming only the second woman to hold the title twice.
Recent years
In 2025 she won a Grand Prix tournament at Pune and reached the final of the Women’s World Cup in Georgia, the first all-Indian final of the event, where she lost in the tie-break games to the nineteen-year-old Divya Deshmukh. She took the bronze medal at that year’s World Rapid Championship. She qualified for the Candidates tournament of 2026, to be held in Cyprus, and withdrew, citing concerns about safety in the region.
Style
She is a classical, positional player with deep opening preparation and great accuracy in the endgame, calm at the board and sparing with her words away from it. She has spoken of how rarely, in her early years, she had sponsors or a team, and of training largely with her father and a computer.
Honours
- Arjuna Award (2003)
- Padma Shri (2007)
- BBC Indian Sportswoman of the Year (2020)
Personal Life
She is married to Dasari Anvesh, a businessman; they have a daughter, Ahana. She lives at Vijayawada and is employed by a public-sector oil company.
She opened the way for the generation of Indian women now at the top of the game, and was for years to women’s chess in India what Viswanathan Anand was to the men’s.
Featured image: Koneru Humpy at a tournament, June 2012. Photo by Seshudak, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
